The web browser is the most ubiquitous and common application that exists today for communicating. Because of this reason, many Identity systems have developed their authentication model assuming the web browser to be their application that initiates authentication. Also, web browser cookies are the most common form of holding the identity of a session that is authenticated.
As long as the cookie is alive at the browser, the authentication at the server is alive and the communication channels that depend on this authenticated session continue to perform their activities. A lot of authentication providers require the web browser to be the application requesting authentication because of the usage of info cards, smartcards, BasicAuth, need for running Java Server Pages (JSPs), JavaScripts and many other browser features.
However, for certain non-web based applications (such as a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) Virtual Private Network (VPN)), keeping the browser open and alive may be annoying and users prefer to close the browser after authentication is done. This kind of a non-web application uses the server's web interface to gain authentication and access policy information. Users may also close the browser accidentally resulting in un-wanted disconnection of their non-web application. Also, the web browsers generally cannot be minimized to the system tray area.